How Will ‘Fear The Walking Dead’ Address The Zombie Infection?

Way back in season one of ‘The Walking Dead’, Rick Grimes and his group learned that every living thing is infected with the zombie virus thanks to a visit to the Center for Disease Control. And since the upcoming companion series ‘Fear The Walking Dead’ takes place in the same world (albeit earlier in the timeline), all the rules still apply. However, according to the man in charge, the characters in the spinoff will experience things a bit differently than the ones from the main show.

In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Robert Kirkman spoke about the rules of his new AMC show coming later this summer. But in talking about how the mythology that they’ve created carries over, the series creator dropped a few hints at how things will be the same yet different:

“Everything that happens in ‘Fear The Walking Dead’ is in the same universe as ‘The Walking Dead’. So any rule that we find out and anything they see in the early days is definitely something that was happening in the past of the other show. These two shows are very intertwined in the same world, even if their characters aren’t necessarily going to interact because of geographical distances. So yeah, anything that you learn from ‘Fear the Walking Dead’ will apply to the mythology of ‘The Walking Dead’ and vice versa. So you are going to get to see that the characters learn that they’re all infected in a much different way. But all the rules do apply and are the same. That will be some of the fun if you’re watching both shows.”

Obviously, learning that you’re infected by some kind of zombie virus is heavy news to take in no matter how you hear it, but considering that you could find out in a much worse way than being told by a scientist, Rick and the gang got off kind of easy. Based on Kirkman’s comments here, it sounds like the cast of ‘Fear The Walking Dead’ are in for a rude awakening whenever they’re informed of this shocking development. There is a number of different ways that this could go down, so I’m looking forward to seeing how it actually plays out in the six-episode first season. But until the show debuts in August, share your thoughts and theories about how they’ll make this discovery in the comments below.

Ben Silverio

Ben F. Silverio received a degree from Drexel University in the Screenwriting and Playwriting Program with a minor in Television Production. While at Drexel, Ben co-founded and co-hosted a film review show called The Pretentious Film Majors, which has evolved into a multi-format form of entertainment including blogs, podcasts on iTunes, articles in the school paper, and a potential tv show. Now armed with an extremely expensive piece of paper, Ben can begin climbing the treacherous ladder of the entertainment industry, which he hopes to do while streaming WWE wrestling matches, reading Marvel comics, and blogging about the excessive amount of movies and tv shows that he watches, all on the iPhone that is permanently attached to his hand.